It looks like the town of Wallkill, New York, is getting a little excitement coming to them this year. The town of Wallkill is allowing the construction of a quarter-mile indoor karting track. This will open at the Galleria at Crystal Run in the fall.

The mall plans to start construction this month on the raceway, FasTrax will start building in the summer, said Ron Paxson, the managing partner of the business.

The raceway will help the Galleria broaden its entertainment offerings beyond the 16-screen movie theatre, O’Connell said. “We wanted to bring a bit more entertainment to Orange County, instead of just the retail side of things.”

At the Galleria, the FasTrax raceway will feature 30 adult carts, and 10 junior carts. The regular price for a 14-lap adult race is $23, according to fastraxraceway.com. The races last seven to 10 minutes.

For those with fond memories of spending entire days in arcades, pouring quarters in machines in a quest for the highest score, ZapCon 2014 will give you an opportunity to relive them this weekend. Taking place at the Renaissance Phoenix Downtown hotel in Phoenix on April 12-13, ZapCon is a pinball and classic arcade convention where attendees can play on dozens of game machines throughout the weekend.

If you need a break from gaming, the convention will also showcase several independent films (about video games and arcade culture of course) over both days. All games will be free to play with purchase of admission. Day passes are $25 and weekend passes are $35; children under 12 get a discounted admission of $15 for a day pass and $25 for a weekend pass. For more information, visit the ZapCon official website.

When it comes to table games no matter what you play you can’t lose but my favorite will always be air hockey. Now I am making this claim from personal knowledge. In my opinion people love air hockey.

We get a lot of people that happen by the arcade and they are interested in only one thing, air hockey. We have three air hockey tables and people are always interested in them, they always have some action going on them.

There is something about going head to head in full one competition with the puck flying at what seems the speed of light. What a great game. I have to say it is one of my favorites as well.

Air Hockey

Interactive sports are always fun, people enjoy the full array of what we offer and the same for the rest of the arcades on the boardwalk, I guess number two would be the Pop a shot Basketball game, but air hockey is the king.

I do not even want to compare Air Hockey with Pool. There is no comparison. Pool is fun but it is a game of leisure, there is no urgency, Pool is played at a very less furious pace, and again that is why I like air hockey.

It is a great game if you have ADHD as it is none stop action for five minutes or until you reach the score of eight.

The company The Best Sync has developed technology that allows skill cranes to work without joysticks and just use hand movements using Intel’s RealSense technology.

Intel Realsense Arcade Skill Crane Claw

The skill crane uses Creative Interactive Gesture Camera (co-developed by SoftKinetic) that allows the player to use simple hand gestures to control the cranes claw. The gestures are limited to simple gestures that position the crane in one of four directions, left, right, forward, and back. When you clench your hand the claw drops.

Intel Realsense Arcade Skill Crane

The players stated that the new technology does not make the game easier but they did say it made it more fun. This opens a whole new door to game play and a new dimension of fun for the users. I can only imagine what will be developed. I can see the “Use the Force” crane or some kind of Darth Vader play. Whatever the case I am sure we will be seeing this new technology in our arcades very soon.

More and more bar arcades are opening around the country and I couldn’t be happier. Most of these venues offer the classic games like Centipede to Qbert, and of course pinball, a bar, and some a full kitchen. The barcade is becoming quite the appealing investment.

Pinball machines in the Barcade

The barcade trend has been growing in popularity across the U.S. during the last decade. Typical barcades have pinball machines and arcade games, and sell locally crafted beers from microbreweries in the area—meshing the childhood nostalgia of gaming with America’s favorite pastime: drinking.

Chicago has seen three of these establishments open recently including Emporium Arcade Bar, 1366 N. Milwaukee Ave.; Headquarters Beercade, 2833 N. Sheffield Ave.; and Logan Arcade, 2410 W. Fullerton Ave. and they are all seeing good success in the market.

Barcades are popping up everywhere, If you are not familiar what these places look like check out the following video, it has a pretty good walk through of a Barcade in New York.

This is a good sign for the arcade industry, it means people are getting tired of playing their video games at home and are starting to mingle again. Nothing beats live interaction and that is where the arcade comes in. It is a place to socialize and have a good time.

When originally released Star Wars Pinball came with three tables to choose from, Empire Strikes Back, The Clone Wars, and Bobba Fett. Later Zen updated the tables to include Return of the Jedi, Starfighter Assault, and Darth Vader bringing them to 6 tables, but this new one is the most exciting of all.

The new Heroes Within table will actually feature four new tables as opposed to three in a pack. These table packs include both good and evil characters to the tables the most popular to date is the droid duo C-3PO and R2-D2, and of course the most popular space smuggler of all time , Han Solo and his side kick Chewbacca is getting their on table.

Zen states that they are going to offer a total of ten tables in the game when it is released in spring of this year.

Lucky’s is Daytona Beach’s premier restaurant, sports bar and entertainment venue – which is saying a lot for the happening Florida city.

Lucky’s Arcade Daytona Beach Florida

Located at 2900 Bellevue Avenue, Daytona Beach, FL., Lucky’s features state-of-the-art bowling in a high energy and contemporary space, with sophisticated dining menus, full service cocktail bars, billiards, arcade games, Plasma TVs as well as an on-site DJ. It is your one stop for a fun night out.

Lucky’s also features some great specials, like Tuesday is Two-Buck Tuesday with all bowling only two dollars a game. You can’t get a better family entertainment value than that.

In addition to having a world class game room the menu in the restaurant is just as top notch; with a full assortment of dishes to satisfy the hungriest of gamers. And to top it off they have a world class bar stocked and ready to go with all your favorite libations.

Lucky’s provides an unparalleled experience that makes everyone feel like a V.I.P. So check out this great video showcasing all Lucky’s in all its grandeur and see for yourself.

When you are looking for fun in Daytona Beach Florida, make sure you check out Lucky’s, the name says it all. For more information you can contact Lucky’s at 386-310-7978.

The wildly popular arcade game from the 80’s, Gyruss, had it’s long standing high score world record beaten by Kim “Kanonarm” Köbke from Denmark and now he is the new world record holder. And he was able to do this after only 49 hours of continuous play. Long live the King of Gyruss!

Gyruss World Record Breaker

Köbke blasted past Neptune and Saturn to 62,200,250 points after 49 hours, 16 minutes of continuous gameplay. The previous world record of 47,024,400 points had stood since 1987.

His game came to a close just after 8 a.m. Eastern time on Monday, March 24. Köbke’s game play was streamed live on Twitch from Denmark’s Chassis Arcade and was played on an original Gyruss arcade machine.

Originally Köbke was shooting for 100 hours on a single coin but he starting to hallucinate, according to witnesses in the arcade. Luckily he was able to smash the record in less time and now holds the title.

Gyruss is a ever popular game, which was released by Konami in 1983, and has often been described as a combination of Namco classic Galaga and Atari’s Tempest. It is still a popular classic arcade game ranking up there with Pac-Man and Tetris.

So now the world record is set and ready for new challengers to try to take the crown!

There are two types of people that come into the arcade where I work, people just there to have fun and people on a mission to get as many tickets as they can for big prizes. Whenever someone asks what is the best game to get the most tickets I always point them towards the Big Bass Wheel.

With the Big Bass Wheel, from Bay Tek Games, gamers step up to and pull the oversized handle to spin the big wheel. When the wheel stops, players are rewarded with tickets. For an even bigger catch, a Big Bass Bonus has been added where players can win up to 1000 tickets for a perfect spin!

The kids love this arcade game as it always seems to pay out the perfect amount of tickets to keep the gamer happy. As the wheel spins some gamers get so excited they shout out “Come-on 1000!” and that draws an audience. Then when the audience in the arcade sees the tickets pouring out of the machine people line up to play.

Big Bass Wheel Arcade Game

I love this machine, it is one of the best we have and never a lick a problems with it either, it always preforms perfectly. It also has two ticket dispensers which is great on multiple levels as the tickets feed from both slots which gives the feeling that the player really hit the jackpot and it cuts down on service time, being that the machine holds stacks of tickets and does not have to be refilled constantly.

I only have one regret with this great machine and that is I don’t have two of them in the arcade. The kids love this game.

So when you are looking for a great earner and a really fun game make sure you look into the Big Bass Wheel Arcade Game from Bay Tek Games.

At the arcade we are getting ready for the 2014 season to start. In Seaside Heights we are starting to get our new toys to showcase for redemption prizes and there are a lot to choose from too. Luckily they just had the 2014 New York Toy Fair and many toys shined. The big winners being LEGO, Forensic Science Kits and robots. They dominated this year’s annual Toy Fair.

Lego

There was a highlight on “Do it yourself” (DYI) toys this year. Creativity and ingenuity where definitely showcased at this years Toy Fair, and here are some highlights. We can also look forward to many more Zombie based genre toys. Zombies are hot right now.